Tony won't give it up.

The word "immaterial" appears nowhere in any of the documents he cites. The best he can do is to quote Judge Wright as saying that it "might...be inadmissable." From this, he somehow reverses the meaning to be that it "might be relevant." But that's good enough for me. Something that might be relevant can hardly be said to be definitely immaterial.

And the fact remains that Clinton couldn't know before his testimony whether or not it was material. Witnesses are not allowed to decide for themselves whether or not their lies are material--their oath is to "tell the truth, the whole truth, so help them God."

Even if it was ruled immaterial after the fact (it was not), that doesn't in any way mitigate the potential penalties for the behavior--it was certainly attempted perjury, if not actual, and flies in the face of his duty as both a citizen and the chief executive officer of the nation, bound by oath to follow and enforce the Constitution and see that laws are faithfully executed.

As to why Clinton hasn't been indicted, only Mr. Ray can answer that question. My interpretation of it is that 1) after the Susan McDougal experience, he figured that there would be no way to get a conviction--there will always be at least one juror who refuses to consider the evidence when it comes to the poor charismatic ex-President, and hangs the jury, and 2) there are rumors that a deal was cut with the Democrats in Congress at the beginning of the Bush Administration--no Clinton (either of them) prosecutions in exchange for allowing nominations to go through. I wouldn't be shocked (though I remain saddened at the ongoing corruption of the Democratic Party, if such rumors be true).

However, there is this interesting little bit of news along that line.

The FBI raid may also be a sign that the reported no-prosecution deal for the Clintons, demanded by Democrat leaders as the price for President Bush getting some of his legislative agenda implemented, is beginning to unravel - since Democrats seem to have kept little if any of their part of the bargain.